Leviathan
Leviathan (pronounced: "leh-VY-uh-than") is one of the Endbringers. He is the second of the Endbringers to appear, making him the "middle child" between Behemoth and the Simurgh. Despite not having as much sheer power as Behemoth or being as intelligent as the Simurgh, he is still a very destructive and dangerous threat that is far more intelligent than he appears to be. Appearance Leviathan is thirty feet tall with a seemingly disproportionate body and scaly green skin. He has a top-heavy appearance due to his hunched shoulders and the large cords of muscles standing out on his neck, upper torso, and shoulders. The top-heavy appearance is only strengthened by his much thinner forearms and calves, topped off with massive claws and digitigrade feet. At the rear end of his body is a prehensile whip-like tail around 40-50 feet long.Extermination 8.2 Leviathan weighs nearly nine tons.Getting hit by something Leviathan that weighed nearly nine tons sent men, women, boys and girls in costume flying, if it didn't kill them outright. - Extermination 8.3Leviathan is the middle child. He's fast enough that he can run on the surface of water, despite weighing something like 9 tons - Wildbow on Reddit His face lacks any kind of mouth, nose, or ears, with the only features being four cracks containing glowing green orbs that resemble eyes. These eyes are placed asymmetrically, with three on the left side of the face and one on the right.Extermination 8.2 At some point, Leviathan seemingly developed a fifth eye.Leviathan had perched himself atop the castle's highest tower ... Even through the rain, his five eyes glowed. - Cockroaches 28.5 This eye appeared due to battle damage.WOG on Reddit When walking on two legs he sways his upper body back and forth in sync with the swaying of his arms, using his tail for balance. However he is far more balanced and significantly faster once on four legs, fast enough to run on the surface of the water. Within water he moves faster than any speedster, almost appearing to teleport. He leaves an "afterimage" of water whenever he moves, equivalent to the volume of whatever body part is in motion, perpetually shrouding him in water. Abilities and Powers Macro-Hydrokinesis Leviathan's main power (and by far is his most powerful) is the manipulation of water on a massive scale. He often preludes his arrival to his target with a torrential downpour and a tsunami, which he continuously creates throughout the battle. Each one of these waves is more powerful than the last, eventually becoming powerful enough to topple entire buildings. The frequency of these is dependent on whether he is able to focus his ability on them, meaning a sustained attack can delay them. He often uses these to cripple strategic areas like evacuation centers or and smaller ones to change the balance of the battlefield if he begins to lose the advantage. However the true strength of this ability is to create extreme amounts of water pressure and movement in unseen places such as underground aquifers or coastlines. If not stopped soon enough he can create forces tremendous enough to collapse cities or even sink entire islands as seen with the complete destruction and disappearance of Newfoundland and certain parts of Japan. The only weakness to this ability is that it lacks fine control. When working with relatively small amounts of water the best he can do is create shield-like geysers or send smaller waves to throw off opponents. This means he can't do things like manipulating water within the body or pinpoint high pressure drilling. After-Echo Along with his hydrokinesis, Leviathan has an "echo" of water that appears whenever he moves. For any body part moved, voluntarily or being attacked, water will appear seemingly out of nowhere to fill the space in the air where that body part just was. This water will maintain the speed and direction of the area that created it, even if the movement of that area changes. For example if he whips his tail then quickly stops it, the water produced from that movement will continue forward at the same deadly speed as the tail was moving (something he uses to greatly increase the range of his attacks). Normal physics still apply to this water and it can be manipulated by him afterwards. Super-Speed Leviathan also possesses the ability to move at extremely fast speeds, allowing him to move around the battlefield faster than most heroes can retreat and rapidly dodge the slower ranged attacks. Dodging his attacks is nearly impossible given how fast he can move. Combined with his other two main powers he can flood the battlefield with his after-echo very quickly and run on the top of the water when it's too shallow to dive into. Once submerged though these combine to allow him to move at speeds so fast it resembles teleportation. This is unrelated to his hydrokinesis.Mook: That sounds like fanon. Where was it stated that Leviathan used hydrokinesis for that? It seems more like he just has super strength and super speed in addition to his hydrokinesis (and durability). Wildbow: It is fanon. - Comment by Wildbow Fins Following the Simurgh's upgrades to him in Gold Morning, Leviathan gained fins, which are just as tough as the rest of his body. They also sport nano-thorns, a blur of microscopic blades stolen from Defiant's design, which turns things to dust on contact. This is the reason the water around him turns to mist with the fins unfolded. Other Powers Leviathan has the standard Endbringer powers as well. These include extremely durable skin, stronger than tungsten flesh only 6% towards the core, regeneration that only quickens the deeper the wound is, massive strength, great intelligence, and a core so dense that it breaks the laws of physics. History Oslo, Norway On June 9th, 1996 was the first appearance of Leviathan. After 5 consecutive attacks by Behemoth over the past 4 years this most likely caught defending forces off guard. Other than that few details are known. Sydney, Australia Another attack was in January 18th 1998 in Sydney, Australia. The city was rebuilt using international funds allowing for urban renewal.Sydney was destroyed but would've been rebuilt. Other areas that suffered direct or incidental damage received a great deal of international funding and support... which declined as time went on. Sydney was early enough in the grand scheme of things to get some attention, before the decline & the crisis fatigue of the world at large. In the Wormverse notes, it doubled down on its nickname the 'The Harbor City' in that it gratefully received the international support, rebuilt, and tried to transform the negative into a positive by providing shelter and support to others (That is, safe harbor). The good was a great deal of national pride (and international pride in the country). In terms of the bad, well, I actually wrote the notes before the whole political shift and the voice xenophobia has found in politicians in recent years, but you could see new Sydney as a kind of microcosm of that sentiment. While it offered shelter to the displaced and the needy, it also was argued to be a shelter and haven for crime and shady types looking for a footing. Dunno if you're far enough along that you can't use that note, but such is my jotted-down notes in the Worm bible, re: Australia. (I'll leave Canberra aside) - Comment by Wildbow on Reddit Kyushu, Japan His sixth attack, on the night of November 2nd, 1999 continuing into the morning of the 3rd, Leviathan surfaced at the southernmost island of Japan, Kyushu, while pummeling the entire country with tsunamis. In a display of intelligence he strategically cut off and destroyed evacuation efforts. This attack was incredibly devastating as most of Japan's native heroes were killed along with 9.5 million civilians. The battle finally ended when Lung fought him to a standstill and he collapsed Kyushu as he retreated. 3,000,000 evacuees were left homeless and Japan was effectively reduced to a third world country. Hyderabad, India No details on this battle were revealed except that that it took place on July 6th, 2001. The interesting thing is though is that Hyderabad is over 217 miles inland from the Indian Ocean. But upon closer examination there is a route to the city from the ocean. Leviathan would have had to snake his way up the Krishna River and the Musi River, the latter of which is barely 10 feet deep in some places, requiring tremendous effort just to attack this one city. Newfoundland, Canada On May 9th, 2005 Leviathan began an attack on the Canadian island of Newfoundland. However the defending heroes once again didn't stop him soon enough and he managed to sink the entire island, killing half a million people, including Andrew Richter. From this point on his targets were classified as hard, meaning heroes could stand their ground and gradually wear him down, and soft, meaning he must be attacked quickly and not given a chance to build up his attacks. Brockton Bay At the end of Buzz 7.12 a program designed to predict Endbringer attacks anticipated his arrival in Brockton Bay. Air raid sirens were activated to alert the public and allow them to evacuate to the local Endbringer shelters. Meanwhile every major Protectorate and Wards group on call began arriving via teleportation along with a few villains. They joined local capes, including Skitter and the Undersiders. Consequences The attacks by Leviathan from his appearance up to 2011 had had global consequences. Attacks on sources of fresh water has led to a water crisis.Comment by WildbowWay I see it, having a local team of superheroes is like having a sports team. Everyone's rooting for them, they make for great media that isn't about wars or the water crisis or whatever - Agitation 3.6 The shipping industry was hurt, although not entirely extinguished, by his (and to a lesser extent the other Endbringers') attacks on port cities.Shipping wasn't hurt because of boats - Leviathan tended to have periods of activity where he'd attack a city, then retreat to deep water. Boats weren't really hurt, except incidentally. Shipping was hurt because ports in target cities and port cities near the targets were left devastated. (Also port cities visited by Simurgh/Behemoth/Tohu Bohu/Khonsu) Shipping still is a thing in the Wormverse. - Wildbow on Spacebattles Leviathan's devastation of Kyushu led to particularly dramatic consequences. Japan was no longer a world power, and was dependent on international assistance as of 2011. The wave of refugees caused minor unrest around the world. Many settled in the United States of America, where President Bradley passed a Preservation Act that helped them. His attacks on Sydney and Newfoundland, which left them unrecoverable, also had wide-ranging effects on the world. Later Appearances Following the destruction of Behemoth, Leviathan would start to adapt hit and run tactics, attacking several targets at a time. Gold Morning Around the same time Tattletale "recruited" Simurgh, Leviathan joined the fight against Scion too. Leviathan was first "assigned" to go to a city created and controlled by the Elite through the powers of one of their members to destroy it. Within an hour he had demolished and flooded the entire city with his after-echo and a torrential downpour, killing almost all of the Elite present. When Skitter's group arrived he was resting on top of one of the skyscrapers. Once Simurgh arrived in the area she immediately slammed into Leviathan and stabbed a long black blade she had built into his core. They remained frozen in place at the top of the tower until she let Leviathan crash to the ground. It soon became apparent that she had upgraded him with the sword as he sprouted collapsible nano-blade fins over his body. A serrated growth of fins sprouted along his spine and tail, ending in a bulb of blades at the tip. Several more grew along his neck and up the length of his forearms. During the final battle he managed to fight Scion head-on for a little bit before he retreated. As the battle moved over the ocean he took to suppressing the tidal waves caused by it as he regenerated. At the final staging area at New York, Earth Beta, he took Scion on directly with the support of the other Endbringers. However Scion still managed to tear open his chest and obliterate his core with a sphere of golden light, killing him instantly. Trivia *The fatality rate for a fight with Leviathan was 1 in 4 parahumans.Extermination 8.1 * He is implied to have attacked the San Fransisco Bay Area and sunk Emeryville, One of its cities at one point.LacePrisonQueenBreaker: On a semi-related note, was taking a look at the map for WD Oakland campaign and Emeryville is noticeably absent as if that part of the shore fell into the bay or something. Is that intentional, and if so, what happened to wipe a(n admittedly small)town so cleanly off the map? Wildbow: It was intentional, and there's typically one good answer to that question. - comment by WildBow *Leviathan roughly means the twisting one and is the second creature in what can be called an Abrahamic trinity of beasts. As Ziz is first among the creatures of the air, and Behemoth is first among the creatures of the land, Leviathan is first among the creatures of the water. This serves as a larger clue to the Endbringers' constructed nature that they deliberately tap into these belief structures. *The Fallen branch dedicated to Leviathan tend to have duplicative powers. Fanart Gallery Leviathan.jpg|Image by AznFailureGuy on DeviantArt into_the_storm_by_kuraitormentus-dazrxwj.jpg|Image by kuraitormentus on DeviantArt Leviathan 2 by dertodesbote-d8ckt6a.jpg|Image by DerTodesbote on DeviantArt Leviathan by keladry0alanna-d7ld0hv.png|Image by keladry0alanna on DeviantArt Leviathan endbringer by drunkfu-d6fl42s.jpg|Image by drunkfu on DeviantArt Ebf5 submission leviathan by workingorder-d9xlwko.png|Leviathan videogame boss by WorkingOrder leviathan_surfaces_by_acerbiccatharsis-d9775we.png|Image by acerbicCatharsis Levi-BB.jpg|'' Image by Beru-bera ''|link=http://fav.me/d7ok6dd Levia-by-DT.jpg|Image by DerTodesbote|link=http://fav.me/d9vt18o levi.png|Illustration by MrShadowManSir|link=http://fav.me/dbhebej Levi-LP.jpg|Illustration by LatePenguins|link=https://redd.it/9l6io4 Leviathan by whos_to_know.png|Illustration by whos to know|link=https://www.reddit.com/r/Parahumans/comments/dfee2u/fanart_leviathan/] S-Class Threats.jpg|S-Class Threats by BenswFrenefits|link=https://redd.it/dvlmba extermination.jpg|Extermination by Blasterweave on Deviantart|link=https://www.deviantart.com/blastweave/art/Extermination-756255220 References Site Navigation Category:Characters Category:Endbringers Category:Mover Category:Brute Category:Blaster Category:Shaker Category:S-Class Threats Category:Deceased Category:Worm Characters Category:Ward Characters